My Year of Opera: Anna Bolena

Not much to say about this one: Donizetti, Sutherland, what’s not to enjoy? I was particularly taken with Roquefort’s performance (Gidon Saks). Not much to the story, of course, pretty much what you’d expect. I can see why this doesn’t get done as much as Donizetti’s more famous works. No one aria or scene really stood out to me.

My favorite part of the experience was relaying the plot to Daria who watched most of this with me. She wasn’t into the whole British History aspect of the story, so I used the best analogy I could: Batman.

Imagine that Anna is Batman and the King is Catwoman. But then Catwoman is hooking up with Alfred (or Robin, take your pic). The first scene of the opera is basically a party at Wayne Manor where everyone at the part knows that Catwoman is seeing Alfred (including Batman who doesn’t want to let on that he knows). Then in the next scene, you get to see Alfred and Catwoman together and Catwoman is conflicted about the whole thing. Meanwhile, in the Batcave…